Pages

Monday, April 23, 2012

Gift From Kitty

Have you ever had a pet bring you a ‘gift’
from the outdoors? Recently my mother informed me of a neighbor’s cat. The
neighbor in question had forewarned her that his outdoor friendly cat likes to
catch live snakes and bring them home. The neighbor also expressed there might
be reason to believe the cat could indeed bring these live snakes to others in
the neighbor it’s well acquainted with. When my mom relayed the conversation to
me it got us to thinking of a special time in my early teens when my cat Tony
at the time, had brought us half a dead squirrel. No I don’t mean it was half
alive, I mean it was literally the top half of the poor little creature’s body.
Pure suburban road kill that an adorable black and white cat had dropped
between us girls so proudly and pleased with himself.

Instantly my mother and I had begun
hysterically jumping around and screaming. This wasn’t like a dead bird we’ve unfortunately
had cats catch and bring into the house before. Perhaps though the comic relief
moment looking back on it, was when my freshly visually impaired father came
into the room with a wad of paper towels ready to take care of the dead animal.
He was of course asking us where it was and not thinking of how he couldn’t
see, we simply pointed and screamed “It’s over there!” Tony, my cat at the time
who so thoughtfully brought this present to us looked as puzzled as a cat can
from all the commotion. Maybe that’s why he opted to pick it up and move it
before my dad could pin-point where we were attempting to direct him as he was
asking us, “Over where?”. It was when Tony picked it up to move it did my
mother and I begin a whole new round of screams. Although we did manage to calm
ourselves somewhat (not really, but let’s pretend shall we?) enough to finally
inform my dad where the half-squirrel was and eventually the poor dead animal
was taken care of.

Looking back on it, my parents and I do have
a good laugh over the experience now. My cat Tony is no longer with us, hasn’t
been for quite a number of years. However, his presence is most certainly marked permanently in
our memories thanks to that unforgettable moment.